Local history: Bridge building projects in Mayo in 1829

By Tom Gillespie

THE pioneering Scottish engineer Alexander Nimmo came to Ireland in 1811 and remained in the country until the time of his death in 1832.

During this time he was employed by a number of government bodies in various key road and pier building projects.

Initially he worked for the government-appointed Bog Commission. When his term with that body was over in 1813, he remained on to take up a number of private commissions in various parts of the country.

Clifden-born author Kathleen Villiers-Tuthill, in her 2006 book Alexander Nimmo and The Western District, described his visit and his bridge repair work in 1829.

Nimmo was issued with £10,699. 1. 6d for work in his district in 1829; most of this went towards repairing and completing bridges.

In Mayo, work was resumed on the coast road from Killala to Broadhaven, which had been suspended for some time.

The surface of the road had sustained considerable damage in the interim and bridges were left unfinished, but the people had succeeded in making their own ‘temporary passes, so as to take advantage of the portion done’.

Following repairs the road was made passable for a carriage from Killala to Belderg, with the exception of Glenlassera bridge, where they were forced to unload and to transfer their goods across the river, before continuing on with their journey.

Nimmo reported that a ‘considerable increase of culture and population (had), even in its imperfect state, occurred from this opening’, and a number of good stone houses had been built at Behy, Glenlassera and Belderg.

He was anxious to link this road with the central Erris road to Bellacorrick, but did not have the funds to proceed.

Seven of the nine bridges damaged on the central Erris road by the ‘torrants in June 1828’ were repaired in 1829. The remaining two bridges at Fauleen and Bonavon (Bunnahowen), between Bangor and Belmullet, were left unfinished. Nimmo described the Bonavon Bridge as ‘a respectable work’.

The number of houses at Belmullet had nearly doubled by 1829 and three large corn stores, ‘of three floor each’, were built and held 1,000 tons of corn for sale directly to the British market.

The corn was grown locally in Broadhavan and Doonkeeghan and, prior to this, had been used exclusively in the manufacture of poitín.

The road through Achill was also completed that year, making it possible for a light carriage, by crossing the sound at low tide, to travel from the mainland to Keel on the western side.

Nimmo’s assistant wrote with enthusiasm: ‘It is surely a new sight to see horses and cart with 10 cwt of flour on it going through Achill Island.’

It was expected that the one cart owner on the island would soon be joined by others.

However, the old road from Newport to the commencement of the new road to the island was in need of realignment, having ‘many steep hills quite unfit for loaded carriages’.

The benefit to the islanders was considerable: ‘The convenience to the population is very great; they bring their corn to the shore at sauna of Cashel by the new road, and thence send it by boat to Westport or Belmullet, or to take it on horseback across the sound.’

But still no work had been done on the ferry piers, which Nimmo considered ‘the most necessary improvement’.

Some levelling and fencing had been carried out on the road from Westport to Killary Harbour. Paving work had been done under Erriff Bridge in 1829, but work on the parapet walls was suspended for the season.

It was, however, passable and corn from the head of Lough Corrib was taken across it by cart to the market at Westport instead of Galway, ‘though the distance is nearly equal’, because of the inferior state of the Galway road.

Mountain floods and high tides in 1828 had also damaged the Killary end of this road and had brought down Leenaun Bridge, the collapse of which, and the many attempts to reconstruct it, is referred to by Maria Edgeworth in 1833: ‘Here was an arm of the sea, across which Mr. Nimmo had been employed to build a bridge, and against Big Jacky Joyce’s advice her would build it in some part, where Jacky prophesied it would be swept away in the winter; but twice the bridge was built and twice was swept away.

‘Still Nimmo said it was all the fault of the masons and the embankment, and his theory of bridges could not be wrong; and a third time he built - and there we saw the bridge or the ruins of it left in the sands, embankment swept away.’

However, as the road was still passable for carts, the bridge and road at this time (1829) were left in their damaged state.

Cross upon the deep bog, the large arch has been closed at Maum Bridge, at the head of Lough Corrib, and the river diverted to its new courses: ‘We have added the wing walls, turned the rived into its new course and filled the old bed, and carried an embankment across and upon the deep bog, so that it is now passable for carts.’

The arches at Toombeola Bridge were closed and the line from there to Clifden was given an additional gravelling.

Thomas Martin had completed the quay at Cloonisle and was expected to build stores at the mouth of the Ballynahinch River. Work was still in progress on the Roundstone road south of Errisbeg. North of Clifden the new roads were kept in repair but little progress was made on the road on the southern shore of Killary Harbour.

Nimmo reported that improvements in Connemara were continuing. ‘A spirit seems to have ben infused into the district likely to produce important results, if not untimely checked.’

Nimmo was already aware of how nature had a way of ‘checking’ any progress in this corner of Ireland.